She Walked Away
by Dove of Ages
Summary: Haruhi couldn't stand it anymore, so she left. And it's killing Hikaru slowly.


_Actually, this might turn into more than a one shot... I kind of hope not, though. Anywho... this is random, but I think I will like writing it... This song is by BarlowGirl; it's called 'She Walked Away'. And, fyi, the end isn't very satisfactory. Want another chapter? Let me know. _

_-.-_

_She couldn't take one more day,_

_Home was more a prison now..._

She was a prisoner in her own home; not a prisoner as in she was kept home constantly, but more or less, she felt trapped. It was a feeling she assumed a person would feel if they were in prison.

She was trapped in a never ending cycle of cleaning up after her cross-dressing father; every day after school she came home to the same mess, the same drunk father, the same people 'visiting' from his work, but it was more like they lived there now.

She was furious with him, but never got a chance to tell him to quit. He was too drunk to listen and understand.

School wasn't much better at all; she got about 2.5 seconds of alone time before one of the host members shattered her silence. She was with the twins during all of her classes, and they forced her into the lunch room come lunch time. The thirty minutes of nothing between her last class and Host Club was often intruded upon by the twins or Tamaki, who would barge in babbling something about being so worried about her.

Not to mention the fact that the host members were concerned for her 'financial well being'. 'Secretly' they were paying for things she very well could have payed for herself; she felt like she was being forced into a box that she couldn't escape from ever.

The 'security' they were giving her was a cage, not a safeguard.

She felt like a slave at home.

And at school she didn't have a seconds peace.

She was trapped in a never ending cycle.

_Independence called out,_

_She had to get it..._

She needed to be free of all this junk; it was driving her to the edge! And if it didn't drive her over it, then something else would.

Everything was too much for her; she was going to break. She was going to shatter.

_A fight was all she needed,_

_to give her reason..._

The first fight was at home; her dad was sober enough to fight back today.

It was about meaningless, stupid stuff. Things that didn't relate to what she was angry about. But it was a big fight, and she left home furious and brooding.

School was horrible; she was in a bad mood and the Hitachiins couldn't take a hint. They bothered her all during class, lunch, class and she barely escaped to the library.

She sat back in a chair in a far corner of one of the libraries; it was one of the darker, dustier, far less used corner, and she personally enjoyed the extreme silence that filled it. Almost like there was an invisible force field around it.

She sighed and closed her eyes, relaxing a little before she cracked open her philosophy book.

Almost as soon as she relaxed, two sets of hands swept down upon her and carried her away, completely against her will. She was too taken by surprise to react.

When she was dumped into the Host Club she exploded, though it started innocently enough.

"Can't I have ten minutes peace?" she demanded the twins in furry, glaring at them.

And the twins, being the twins, cocked their heads and smiled cheekily at her. "Nope."

And she exploded. There was nothing to stop her now.

_She slammed the door with no good-bye,_

_and knew that it was time..._

The argument raged hard; it was an all out battle between her and Hikaru, whom were both equal in perpetual stubbornness. The others stood by watching, to scared to interfere.

It ended something like this.

"Why do you feel that you have to be with me every second of the day? I'm not a helpless weakling!" she yelled.

"We're with you cuz we care about you!"

"Maybe I don't want you to care about me!"

"Well to bad, cuz we do anyways! And for your information, you _are_ helpless! You wouldn't survive in this school if you didn't have us! You'd be a miserable loner with no friends!"

It was a stupid fight, it really was. The shocked silence that followed this statement was entirely unbearable. The other host members winced, even Kyoya, the unshakable rock of emotionlessness. They all knew that Hikaru had gone too far.

Haruhi, by far, was the most shocked. She glared at him, tears of stress, hurt and anger welling in her huge eyes. Then her furry retook her, stronger than it had been before. She glared hard at Hikaru, still fighting tears, and screamed, "I hate you!"

The door slammed.

And there was no good-bye.

_Now she's driving too fast, _

_She didn't care to glance behind, _

_And through her tears she laughed..._

She sat in the taxi, speeding along streets she didn't care to recognize. She was flying out of this place, with the money the Host Club had put into her bank account and the passport Kyoya had given her when the Club had went on an out of country trip.

She didn't realize that tears were dripping down her face as she checked her small bag to make sure she had what she would need. She had rushed home to pack a few things. Only essentials. She would get other things when she got where she was going.

She checked the small pocket in her purse, which was bulging with all the money from her account.

She laughed softly and reached up to unconsciously wipe her eyes.

She was going to terminate her place at Ouran and take a test to enter a different school under a different name. Maybe they wouldn't find her.

She laughed again and the driver looked at her strangely.

_It's time to kiss the past good-bye..._

It was time she showed them exactly how strong she could be... by herself.

She wouldn't be coming back.

_I'm finally on my own, _

_Don't try to tell me no..._

Wiping away the tears she had just now noticed, she felt a sudden vibration in her pants' pocket. Slowly, tears falling again, she pulled the phone from her pocket.

She knew who it would be before she even looked at the name.

Hikaru Hitachiin.

Her throat ached and her heart clenched. But she didn't falter in her plans.

"Don't try to tell me no.." she whispered. She slowly unrolled the window and then gently threw the phone out. She looked back and spotted it, sitting in a deep puddle.

"Don't try to tell me no."

_There's so much more for me,_

_Just watch what I can be..._

"We're here miss." the driver told her, as he pulled up to the airport terminal building.

Haruhi, sniffing and wiping her nose, quickly payed the driver and stepped from the vehicle. This was it. She was leaving.

They would see. She would prove to them that she could be something! Without their help.

There was more than this, so much more.

She would prove that she wasn't helpless. She would prove it!

_She walked away, _

_couldn't say, why she was leaving._

_She walked away,_

_she left all she had believed in._

_She walked away..._

It was the start of a new life for her.

It was the end of an old one.

She left the host club, the people she had trusted, loved, believed in.

She left her father.

And more importantly, she realized, she left Hikaru. That thought nearly turned her right around.

_No._ She told herself as she stepped onto the plane. This was it, this was goodbye.

Even if she loved him with all her heart.

_Another day goes by,_

_for the ones she's left behind,_

_they're always asking why, _

_as thoughts of her comes through their minds..._

It had been days.

Weeks.

Months.

Hikaru wasn't even sure how long it had been since she had left. He hadn't bothered to keep track. He just wanted her back.

He looked out the window, watching the rain fall and the lighting streak the sky. Was it storming where Haruhi was? Wherever that might be. Was she by herself, alone and scared? Did she miss him? Did she even think about him at all?

He sighed, miserable. Why had he said those awful things to her? He had driven her away! It was his fault that she had left.

The door to his room opened, letting in a shaft of light that silhouetted his twin's figure.

"Hikaru..." Kaoru said, squinting. "Why is it so dark in here?"

Hikaru didn't reply. He wanted it to be dark. He didn't want anyone who entered the room to see how miserable he was. He was sure that it showed on his face.

Kaoru, though, wasn't just anybody. He knew that Hikaru was suffering horribly because of what he had said to Haruhi. He knew that it still hurt Hikaru to talk about or see pictures of or hear stories of Haruhi.

It hurt Kaoru, too, but not as badly as it did Hikaru.

"Hikaru... about Haruhi..." Kaoru started slowly.

"Why...?" Hikaru croaked, interrupting him. He sounded close to tears. "Why did I say that stuff to her? Why did she leave?"

Kaoru sighed. He couldn't say anything to his brother about her without upsetting him.

_God please let her know, _

_the love we tried to show, _

_We promise anything,_

_if you'll just bring her home..._

Hikaru wandered the streets of a town that was distant from Ouran, following a possible lead that Kyoya had told him. He shivered, cold and wet.

"I'd do anything..." he whimpered, wrapping his already soaked jacket around his body tighter. "If I could just see her again." he was without hope of finding her, or ever seeing her again. It had been a year now. A whole year! A year was too long to be deprived of the woman he was desperately in love with.

"Just bring her home..." he whimpered, stopping and turning his head up so that the rain fell directly on his face. He was hiding the hot tears that slipped from his eyes. "I'll do anything! I love her so much... Just tell her that... Tell her I love her... Please..."

He collapsed to his knees and buried his face in his hands. He didn't want to do this anymore.

He didn't want to be without her.

_She walked away, _

_couldn't say, why she was leaving._

_She walked away,_

_she left all she had believed in._

_She walked away..._

Haruhi looked out the front door of her apartment building. It was raining... again. It rained a lot where she was now. It had never rained this much in...

She halted the thought. She wasn't going to go there today. She didn't want to think about Hikaru, her father and the host club.

She couldn't even remember why she had left, for Pete's sake! But that didn't mean she was going to go back.

Sighing slightly, she opened her umbrella and stepped outside.

_Tell her we love her,_

_tell her she's wanted,_

_one more thing God,_

_tell her, please come,_

_home...._ _Please come home.._

Nothing Hikaru did made any sense anymore, not without her. Moving, walking, breathing, talking,_ living_ felt wrong. She was part of him, whether she knew it or not. She was part of his world.

Heck, she was his entire world!

Kaoru was a part of it too, sure, but he didn't love Kaoru like he loved Haruhi. He loved Haruhi with everything he was, and everything he was ached for her to be back by his side.

He hadn't moved from the sidewalk in the rain for a long time. His mind kept saying, _Please, Haruhi, come home... come home..._ _I need you..._

Then a quiet, heart stopping voice broke through his wall of misery.

"Hikaru?"

_She walked away, _

_couldn't say, why she was leaving._

_She walked away,_

_she left all she had believed in._

_She walked away..._

Hikaru's whole body froze. A shudder ran down his spine. It _couldn't _be. Did... Did he dare even hope..?

The voice came again, tantalizing and sweet. "Hikaru?"

Slowly, he raised his head. There she was. He caught his breath. Her hair was longer and she had grown, in more than one way. Her huge brown eyes looked at him in shock, disbelief and... love?

"Haruhi...?" he murmured, still not believing that it was her. But it was. She was real. It was her.

They both moved at the same time, both desperate to make sure the other was real. Hikaru jumped to his feet and Haruhi dropped her umbrella. They made a mad dash to hug each other.

"Haruhi..." Hikaru sobbed into her hair as he held her tight to his soaked body. She smelled good and the warmth from her skin warmed him.

She was crying too, her face buried in his neck.

Hikaru had found her.

Haruhi had found him.

And, one year after her departure, they were together.

Together...


End file.
